Bright Young Things

I’m not an expert on anything; sometimes I know a bit or can express myself lucidly. I deployed this as an oil futures broker. Yesterday a friend asked me how she should address formally (on the envelope) the divorced wife of a younger son of a marquess who has subsequently remarried.

Milestones

I’m curious but not observant. I read on another blog about three things I have often walked past and never noticed; milestones. Like trig points and urban boot scrapers they are redundant. No doubt pillar boxes and public ‘phone booths will follow.

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Bugles and a Tiger

Soldiers are often able to put down the sword and take up a pen; from Julius Caesar to John Hackett. When we were in Wales recently I was introduced to a new-to-me soldier turned wordsmith: John Masters.

The Arab Boy

I have never seen this fascinating picture but at least one reader may have when it took its holidays in Boston in 2015; home is Kansas City.

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Uncle Herbrand

Although I was eleven when he died, I don’t remember Uncle Herbrand well. I do often think of him as I have his hairbrushes.

It’s Too Late Now

There was only ever one solution to Brexit. I often talk what what you might term bollocks; I’d merely call it nonsense. But in 2016 I made two good calls: that Parliament would obstruct Brexit and the best way forward was to join the European Economic Area (EEA).

Two Englishmen Abroad

Alistair Cooke’s radio broadcasts are beautifully modulated, finely crafted, miniature masterpieces. To stumble upon one is to find a Fabergé egg in the henhouse; although Peter Carl Fabergé made only fifty-two Imperial Easter eggs and Alistair Cooke delivered 2,869 editions of Letter from America.

Ducks in a Row

Two red-eared terrapins bookend a pair of ducks and a cormorant at Chiswick House yesterday. While the gardens have evolved the basic layout is William Kent’s and almost all his eye-catching features remain, including Burlington Gate.

Pembroke Lodge

Here’s a list of Oxford graduates with a PPE. I got a PEA at Durham; Psychology, English and Anthropology.

The Little Things in Life

It’s the little things in life that give disproportionate pleasure. Recently I have been given two presents.  This lens and screen cloth is almost too good to use – I may get it framed. If you’d like one, it’s on the National Gallery of Ireland website. 

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Categorised as Art